(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – April 1, 2013) A group of President Vladimir Putin’s advisors are considering reintroducing the position of vice president a move that might create conditions for a smooth transition of power to Putin’s presumed successor. “There are a lot of downsides to it, since we don’t want to return to the situation with Rutskoi,” said […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW. March 28, 2013) Russia’s Presidential Human Rights Council is expecting Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika to explain the purposes of numerous inspections of non-governmental organizations (NGO) at the upcoming session of the council in April. “We have asked the Prosecutor General to participate in the council meeting so that representatives of the Prosecutor’s General Office can report […]
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MOSCOW. March 28 (Interfax) – Prosecutors inspecting non-profit organizations are performing unusual duties, which are virtually repressive, a member of Russia’s Presidential Human Rights Council and board member of Memorial international society, Sergei Krivenko, said. “We tried to draw an analogy with the current unprecedented inspections in Memorial – nothing like that has happened in the past 25 years. The […]
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MOSCOW. March 27 (Interfax) – The existing system of support for nongovernmental organizations in Russia lacks transparency in many respects which obstructs the strengthening of the role of civil society in Russian life. The conclusion can be drawn from the report “Third sector in Russia: the current state and possible development models” compiled by the Fund for Civil Society. “The […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 28, 2013) Fewer Russians approve of the work of the State Duma and many believe that lawmakers are dependent on the Kremlin, a survey released Thursday showed. Thirty-seven percent of respondents surveyed by the Levada Center said that lawmakers are completely dependent on the Kremlin and do whatever the executive branch requests, while 30 […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Claire Bigg – March 26, 2013) Amnesty International has joined a growing list of organizations raided by Russian officials in recent weeks amid what activists describe as a ruthless Kremlin crackdown on dissent. Prosecutors and tax police on March 25 searched the venerable rights watchdog’s Moscow headquarters, along with three other prominent advocacy groups — the […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – March 27, 2013) Unprecedented numbers of independent poll workers will help ensure clean elections in Moscow and St. Petersburg through 2018, a group of leading vote monitors said Tuesday, but the ruling United Russia party and local governments will continue to control polling stations elsewhere, a lingering risk of electoral fraud. In […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Stanislav Kuvaldin, special to RBTH – March 27, 2013) Law enforcement organs are conducting mass checks of Russian NGOs. According to information from human rights activists, more than 40 organizations in 16 regions of Russia have already been inspected. The Justice Ministry and the Public Prosecutor’s Office have announced their intention to check […]
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MOSCOW, March 27 (RIA Novosti) Russian state officials continued a wave of raids on prominent rights organizations on Wednesday that activists describe as a renewed pressure campaign against non-governmental organizations in the country. On Wednesday, officials from the Prosecutor General’s Office and tax control service targeted several more NGOs, including the Moscow offices of Human Rights Watch, Transparency International […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Brian Whitmore – March 26, 2013) You can learn a lot about a regime from the fights it picks. And lately, the Kremlin and its proxies have been picking a lot of fights — both with civil society and with each other. Take, for example, the peculiar public feud that erupted last week between Pavel Gusev, editor […]
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(Institute of Modern Russia – www.imrussia.org – Alexander Podrabinek – March 21, 2013) Despite their mutual aversion, the Russian government and the Russian opposition have one common traita tendency to oversimplify the image of their enemy for propagandistic purposes. Author and analyst Alexander Podrabinek argues that the opposition is making a grave mistake when it focuses all its efforts just […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 26, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-corruption-is.html) For Vladimir Putin’s Russia, corruption is the communism of today, Stanislav Belkovsky argues, and the struggle against it is like the struggle against the CPSU a quarter of a century ago, a battle that will lead to “Perestroika Version Two” and a series of events resembling those […]
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MOSCOW. March 25 (Interfax) – Alexei Pushkov, chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs, believes the liberal media have assumed the role of the right-wing opposition. “The right-wing opposition is now extremely weak. The liberal media have assumed its role. Their attacks on the State Duma and the Kremlin are not just episodes, but a tough fight for […]
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MOSCOW. March 25 (Interfax) – Russia is moving away from its totalitarian past but it is unclear what kind of political system it is heading for, the justice minister has argued. “It needs to be realized that we are getting through an inevitable period of transition from a totalitarian society to another form of society. At the moment, it’s hard […]
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MOSCOW. March 26 (Interfax) – Recent polls indicate that in the opinion of Russian citizens, lawmakers are the wealthiest of civil servants, and they proposed setting an income limit for those seeking civil service. Fifty-five percent of respondents said deputies of the State Duma and the Federation Council are the richest among civil servants, and 52% said government executives are, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anatoly Medetsky – March 22, 2013) The Cabinet on Thursday backed a plan to invigorate the economy of the Far East, and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the government would later this month formally ask the parliament to slash taxes for new business projects in the region. Plans to develop the remote and sparsely populated […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Artyom Danielyan & Olga Tanas – March 22, 1013) Russia’s central bank may change its monetary policy even as its new leadership focuses on continuity, said Elvira Nabiullina, President Vladimir Putin’s nominee to take over as Bank Rossii chairman in June. “Policy continuity should be maintained, because the credibility factor is very important in the banking […]
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MOSCOW, March 22 (RIA Novosti) – The unprecedented posthumous trial of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky for tax evasion began on Friday as investigators denied he was arrested for uncovering major corruption by state officials. This is believed to be the first time a dead person has been prosecuted in either Russian or Soviet history. Magnistky, who worked for the British-based […]
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(Kennan Institute – wilsoncenter.org/program/kennan-institute – Mackensie Knorr – February 19, 2013) Meeting Report As Russia’s Soviet-era oil legacy gradually runs down, the Russian oil industry will face new challenges and higher costs. “This will result in a lower flow of revenue to the Russian government at a time when the Russian state budget has become more dependent on oil than […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 21, 2013) Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the success of democracy in Russia can be evaluated only 100 years from now, according to a transcript of an interview with Western media published Thursday. In an interview with European journalists on Wednesday evening that focused mostly on the financial crisis in Cyprus, the prime minister […]
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(Institute of Modern Russia – imrussia.org – Donald Jensen – March 19, 2013) Despite rumors of his waning influence, Rosneft chief Igor Sechin remains one of the most powerful members of Russia’s ruling establishment. Donald N. Jensen, Resident Fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, discusses Sechin’s latest “string of triumphs.” […]
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MOSCOW, March 20 (RIA Novosti) President Vladimir Putin has submitted to the State Duma the candidacy of his economic advisor, Elvira Nabiullina, for the head of Russia’s Central Bank, the Kremlin said on Wednesday. Putin first proposed Nabiullina’s candidacy on March 12 at a meeting with incumbent Central Bank chief Sergei Ignatyev, who has served three successive terms and […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova and Ezekiel Pfeifer – March 20, 2013) Investigators said Tuesday that they had closed the case into the 2009 death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, whose name is attached to a U.S. law that has caused tension in U.S.-Russian relations by seeking to punish Russians implicated in human rights violations. An inquiry into Magnitsky’s […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Dmitri Travin – March 19, 2013) Dmitri Travin is Research Director at the European University in St. Petersburg’s Centre of Modernization Studies Russia’s ruling party, ‘United Russia’, is significantly weaker than previously. Does Putin still need ‘his’ party or is it now more of a millstone round his neck? The economy is stagnant and the electoral system is […]
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MOSCOW. March 20 (Interfax) – Over a quarter of Russians have nothing against the restoration of monarchy in the country but cannot name a person who could become the tsar now, a poll has indicated. In a choice between two forms of government – monarchy and republic – 11% of Russians opt for the former. Moscow and St. Petersburg have […]
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MOSCOW, March 20 (RIA Novosti) The majority of Russian ministers are against a recently approved ban on US nationals adopting Russian children, Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich said Wednesday. “A lot of people in the Cabinet, the majority, were against the legislation, at least in the form it was passed,” Dvorkovich said at a meeting with students, the Prime […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – March 19, 2013) The big dollop of egg on Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev’s face since it emerged a strip of water in the Barents Sea ceded by the then-president to Norway contains more than $30bn worth of oil and gas spells trouble for the already weakened premier. Russia and Norway had been negotiating […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org Brian Whitmore – March 18, 2013) Vladimir Putin clearly likes to keep an eye on his enemies. Perhaps he should be taking a closer look at his friends. Consider, for example, Kremlin chief of staff Sergei Ivanov. The KGB veteran and was widely considered the odds-on favorite to be Putin’s successor back in 2007 until he was […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 19, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-is-russia-too-big-to.html) Russia’s enormous size is the first thing that strikes observers, a leading Moscow geographer says, but he points out that the implications of its size have varied over time and argues that while size matters, there is no reason to believe that its size necessarily precludes freedom […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 17, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-few-russians-want-to.html) More than 90 percent of ethnic Russians taking part in an online survey do not want to identify as “Rossiyane,” the non-ethnic civic identity President Vladimir Putin has been promoting as the primary self-designator for citizens of the Russian Federation, preferring instead to identify as ethnic Russians […]
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MOSCOW, March 15 (RIA Novosti) – Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who oversees the country’s military-industrial complex, called on Friday for harsher punishments for corrupt officials who “betray the motherland” by siphoning funds from defense projects. “These crimes must be punished in the harshest possible manner,” Rogozin told a meeting of officials from the Russian Federal Service for Defense […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Tim Wall, RBTH – March 15, 2013) Elvira Nabiullina will probably increase Kremlin control over the regulator, but have to balance conflicting demands for looser monetary policy and lower inflation. While President Vladimir Putin’s nomination of Elvira Nabiullina, a former economy minister, as Russia’s new Central Bank chief, has been hailed as a […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – March 14, 2013) Asked to end speculation about the identity of the next chairman of Russia’s Central Bank, President Vladimir Putin promised an “unexpected” candidate who would be well received. When it did come, the announcement that presidential adviser and former Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina would fill the post was a […]
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(Interfax – Moscow, 13 March 2013) The Presidential Council for Human Rights has called for a reform to denationalize federal TV channels in the next few years because it believes that the level of the authorities’ influence on their information policy is blocking the formation of an appropriate picture of modern Russian society. “The Council considers it necessary to recommend […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 14, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-without-inspiring.html) Unless Russia’s “ruling class” comes up with a sufficiently grandiose project capable to inspire the population and give it a new “passionate impulse,” there is little chance that the country will remain “a unified state,” according to a scholar at the Presidential Academy of Economics and State […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Nikolaus von Twickel – March 14, 2013) The salaries of top state employees have doubled since December, but such remunerations remain minute compared with unlawful kickbacks to the echelons of power, an anti-corruption expert said Wednesday. Higher pay amounts to buying loyalty from bureaucrats, but state salaries can hardly act as an efficient tool against […]
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MOSCOW. March 13 (Interfax) – One of the most suspenseful appointment decisions of the past year has come to an unexpected expected conclusion. On one hand, Kremlin adviser Elvira Nabiullina only recently emerged as a potential candidate to replace Sergei Ignatyev as chairman of the Central Bank of Russia (CBR). On the other, after President Vladimir Putin said that he […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Natalya Krainova – March 13, 2013) Members of the political opposition often accuse state officials of grandiose misdeeds, such as falsifying election results, stealing millions from state coffers, or even ordering the killings of their adversaries. Lately, they have begun accusing pro-Kremlin officials of a far less sinister offense, one more often leveled at schoolchildren […]
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(Interfax – March 13, 2013) Russian Central Elections Commission (CEC) Chairman Vladimir Churov has criticized a report issued by a think-tank claiming that the 2011 elections to the State Duma were rigged and that the Communist Party actually garnered more votes in them than the United Russia party. A number of media outlets on Wednesday published conclusions from a report […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – March 13, 2013) The level of trust in government officials and business executives remains dramatically low in Russia, with most residents saying they are more inclined to rely on their colleagues and independent experts, a research company said Tuesday. Only 5 percent of Russians believe that any government official tends to tell […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Scott Rose – March 11, 2013) OAO Gazprom, Russia’s natural gas export monopoly, is thwarting efforts to boost oversight of its $28.9 billion in capital spending as the state seeks to improve investment, Deputy Economy Minister Sergei Belyakov said. “Despite the fact that it’s a state company, even we, to put it mildly, can’t always see […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 12, 2013) President Vladimir Putin has instructed major state companies to unofficially provide tax and financial authorities with information about their deals monthly in an effort to probe corruption. The Federal Tax Service and Federal Financial Monitoring Service receive the information in order to check whether corporate management is affiliated with any businesses, a […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Robert Coalson, Richard Solash – March 11, 2013) What if $230 million went missing and no one wanted to get it back? That is the puzzling question posed by Russia’s years of unwillingness to investigate the well-documented fraud claims made by lawyer and auditor Sergei Magnitsky. At least half a dozen European Union countries, plus Switzerland, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – March 12, 2013) Irina Yarovaya, head of the State Duma’s powerful Anti-Corruption and Security Committee, on Monday became the latest United Russia deputy to face embarrassing allegations of ethics violations with the publication of a report accusing her of de facto owning a multimillion-dollar apartment. Despite declared earnings of 2.9 million rubles […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Brian Whitmore – March 11, 2013) Tsar Peter I once proposed to his prosecutor-general that corrupt officials be either exiled to Siberia or executed. “But then who will be left?” the prosecutor responded, according to the oft-repeated historical anecdote. “We’re all thieves.” President Vladimir Putin repeated this tale during his press conference in December to illustrate […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anya Aseeva – March 11, 2013) The Prosecutor General’s office, together with the Justice Ministry and the Federal Anti-Monopoly Service, has begun conducting large-scale unscheduled checks into non-governmental organizations to determine sources of foreign funding, a news report said Monday. Marina Grudneva, a spokeswoman for the Prosecutor General’s office, said the inspection was being conducted […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – John Freedman – March 11, 2013) Journalist and theater director Mikhail Kaluzhsky called it a “theatrical slam.” Olga Shakina, a journalist from the Dozhd television channel, said it was a moment when “one theatrical event replaced another.” What they were discussing on Saturday on Echo Moskvy radio was a now-notorious performance of “Moscow Trials,” a […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 11, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-hatreds-of-deeply.html) The hatreds Russians feel toward others past and present domestic and foreign are an important reason why Vladimir Putin has been able to maintain himself in power even at a time when polls show that an increasing number of the citizens of his country do not actively […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – March 11, 2013) Two municipal deputies picketed outside the Moscow City Duma last month, but nobody seemed to notice. Few passers-by stopped to ask what their handmade signs meant, and only a handful of journalists showed up to record their entreaties. To be ignored, it seems, is the plight of the municipal […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – www.rbth.ru – Tim Wall, RBTH – March 11, 2013) Russian Presidential Commissioner for entrepreneurs’ rights Boris Titov gives an insight he is helping businessmen successfully deal with pressure from officials through the courts. Boris Titov, Russia’s foremost producer of sparkling wines, knows all too well what it’s like to face pressure from officials. But now, […]
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